Shelly Perry here. I shoot a lot of portraits. It works well for me because I like photographing people, and my people shots are usually good sellers for stock — so sometimes I make twice the money. Occasionally, a client will ask me for a CD of all the images I took of her — good and bad. And so my “Olympic Fuel” tip today is: Don’t give it to her. Some clients think they want a CD of every image you took of them. But what they don’t realize is that when you set up a portrait shoot, you’ll easily take over 100 shots in hopes of getting 12-24 that are good enough to show them. If you were to show them an entire CD of 88 bad photos and 12 good ones, they’d subconsciously focus on the massive amount of bad photographs. This isn’t good for your reputation as a photographer — or for your model’s self-image. You can always use lighting techniques, camera angles, colors, special poses, and other portrait-photographer tricks to bring out your model’s best features. However, there will inevitably be a few shots that don’t come out well… where your model looks a little too heavy, too tired, her eyes are closed, or she’s making a weird face. Do yourself and your model a favor and get rid of those shots. Don’t ever give her the chance to think, “Boy, I’m just not very photogenic, am I?” Give her only the best shots you took and you’ll both be happier in the end. [Editor’s Note: Learn more about how you can turn your pictures into cash in our free online newsletter The Right Way to Travel. Sign up here today and we’ll send you a new report, Selling Photos for Cash: A Quick-Start Guide, completely FREE.]
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